Bright Sheng’s “Intimacy of Creativity” in Hong Kong

The composer Matt Van Brink posted a very interesting article on NewMusicBox about his participating in this year’s “The Intimacy of Creativity,” a chamber music workshop program in Hong Kong created by Bright Sheng 盛宗亮. Sheng lives in Flushing and has been very active in New York’s music scene. He has done a lot of programs with the Flushing Council on Culture and the Arts. But I didn’t know of this one in Hong Kong.

The program adapts the workshop model common in theater and literary world to the creation of chamber music. Young composers present their works in front of experienced composers and student performers, who in turn give feedback. Van Brink write, “[f]or the composers, the open discussion and rehearsal of our music compelled us to see our own works more objectively, opening the door to revision. For the performers, it was an opportunity to engage and connect with the works, and to pass along that excitement to the audience.”